By Neima Nour
I don't know how to pray. But if I could, maybe I would repent, seek forgiveness, seek something that could substitute for addiction. Something that doesn't connect to misery. A home? A family, one that I've chosen. To be something, somewhere I am not disposable.
How do I find that? Where do I find that when my own mother didn't want me, when she thought of me as unsalvageable. Where do I start?
I started writing this because I wanted to get it out of my head, but I've just been dumping everything awful and rotten onto paper. I should go draw. I shouldn't be polluting this journal with my agonizing thoughts. I should do something that dad would want, Something other than the pills, the cutting, the lying, and the drinking, the kind that took him away from me.
BREATHE.
But if I go down that rabbit hole now I'll never come back out. If I start imaging the pieces that have been unearthed, or the little box that I've hidden under my bed—couch, with the shards of glass with pointy edges that I line my fingers on to soothe my sorrows, they’ll all fall out. BREATH and Riley will realize there's nothing left of me to love.
He’ll hate me because I'll no longer be able to inflate his ego. No longer be a child.
No longer useful for the things he takes with no return. He'll hate me like he hates his father—himself. Like I hate myself.
When you think about self-loathing, think about me.
Why? The cuts, the purposeful bruises inflicted by me or from another to me should be enough consolation. What was wrong with me? What is wrong with me? Don’t answer that, me.
If I took a magnifying glass to a stranger, would we be similar? (I doubt it).
If a stranger were to take a magnifying glass to me would they think of me as repulsive? Magnanimous even? Uncontrollable like my mother does? Or would they simply be uninterested?
I heard somewhere that when you grow up in a burning house, you think the whole world is on fire. Fortunately, or unfortunately for me, I’ve been drowning my whole life.
In my world first before anybody else's. But that doesn't change the fact that I’m miles deep, I don't know how to swim, or I refuse to learn. Either one is as bad as the other.
Why do I run away from everything, good or bad? Why do I ruin things, good or bad? Why can’t I try harder, harder than I’m trying? What am I trying to change? For who? Why do I care so much? Why is this not working?
BREATHE, CHARLIE. BREATH.
Trying to stay clean after rehab is harder when everybody around you is using. And sucking you in, and it is working.
I am one of those people who turn themselves into scraps, puzzles, broken pieces. If I were a game I would be called The Girl In Pieces, because of how little of me there is left. All scars and cuts and uglier things.
Things nobody would want. Somebody my mother didn’t—doesn't want, somebody my father left, somebody that can't remember what happened to her dog from when she was a child. Somebody that ruined her best friend.
Me who doesn't care.
Me who nobody cares about.
Me who is unwanted, unimportant, me who is useless, unneeded, uncared for. Me who is Silent Sue, me who is Chuck, me who is Charlotte Davis.
BREATHE.
Charlotte Davis: The Cutter, The Addict, The Girl Who Starves Herself To Feel Full, The Girl Who Lived On The Streets.
The Girl That Does Not Want To Die, But Tightens The Grip On The Knife She Holds Inches From Her Heart…
CHARLOTTE, BREATHE.
And The So Much More Girl, with so much to live for. and as I write this that's what I'm going to be. I will start over, eventually. Start over as Me and just that.
I don't know how to pray. But if I could, maybe I would repent, seek forgiveness, seek something that could substitute for addiction. Something that doesn't connect to misery. A home? A family, one that I've chosen. To be something, somewhere I am not disposable.
How do I find that? Where do I find that when my own mother didn't want me, when she thought of me as unsalvageable. Where do I start?
I started writing this because I wanted to get it out of my head, but I've just been dumping everything awful and rotten onto paper. I should go draw. I shouldn't be polluting this journal with my agonizing thoughts. I should do something that dad would want, Something other than the pills, the cutting, the lying, and the drinking, the kind that took him away from me.
BREATHE.
But if I go down that rabbit hole now I'll never come back out. If I start imaging the pieces that have been unearthed, or the little box that I've hidden under my bed—couch, with the shards of glass with pointy edges that I line my fingers on to soothe my sorrows, they’ll all fall out. BREATH and Riley will realize there's nothing left of me to love.
He’ll hate me because I'll no longer be able to inflate his ego. No longer be a child.
No longer useful for the things he takes with no return. He'll hate me like he hates his father—himself. Like I hate myself.
When you think about self-loathing, think about me.
Why? The cuts, the purposeful bruises inflicted by me or from another to me should be enough consolation. What was wrong with me? What is wrong with me? Don’t answer that, me.
If I took a magnifying glass to a stranger, would we be similar? (I doubt it).
If a stranger were to take a magnifying glass to me would they think of me as repulsive? Magnanimous even? Uncontrollable like my mother does? Or would they simply be uninterested?
I heard somewhere that when you grow up in a burning house, you think the whole world is on fire. Fortunately, or unfortunately for me, I’ve been drowning my whole life.
In my world first before anybody else's. But that doesn't change the fact that I’m miles deep, I don't know how to swim, or I refuse to learn. Either one is as bad as the other.
Why do I run away from everything, good or bad? Why do I ruin things, good or bad? Why can’t I try harder, harder than I’m trying? What am I trying to change? For who? Why do I care so much? Why is this not working?
BREATHE, CHARLIE. BREATH.
Trying to stay clean after rehab is harder when everybody around you is using. And sucking you in, and it is working.
I am one of those people who turn themselves into scraps, puzzles, broken pieces. If I were a game I would be called The Girl In Pieces, because of how little of me there is left. All scars and cuts and uglier things.
Things nobody would want. Somebody my mother didn’t—doesn't want, somebody my father left, somebody that can't remember what happened to her dog from when she was a child. Somebody that ruined her best friend.
Me who doesn't care.
Me who nobody cares about.
Me who is unwanted, unimportant, me who is useless, unneeded, uncared for. Me who is Silent Sue, me who is Chuck, me who is Charlotte Davis.
BREATHE.
Charlotte Davis: The Cutter, The Addict, The Girl Who Starves Herself To Feel Full, The Girl Who Lived On The Streets.
The Girl That Does Not Want To Die, But Tightens The Grip On The Knife She Holds Inches From Her Heart…
CHARLOTTE, BREATHE.
And The So Much More Girl, with so much to live for. and as I write this that's what I'm going to be. I will start over, eventually. Start over as Me and just that.
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